


Don't Let Me Fall

by Goodbye Moonlight (WiggleWorm)



Category: Iron Man (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, Spider-Man: Homecoming (2017)
Genre: Amnesia, Coma, Dissociation, Drowning, Gen, Hospitalization, Hurt Peter, I Wrote This Instead of Sleeping, Memory Loss, Near Death Experiences, Peter Parker Needs a Hug, Protective Tony Stark, Self-Doubt, Tony Stark Acting as Peter Parker's Parental Figure, Tony Stark Has A Heart, its 4 AM what am i doing???, peteys got some near drowning related childhood trama, slight cannon divergences
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-01-13
Updated: 2019-02-03
Packaged: 2019-10-09 09:18:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 3,773
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17404214
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WiggleWorm/pseuds/Goodbye%20Moonlight
Summary: ever since Peter was a small child, he had been scared of water, namely, swimming in said water. So when the Vulture drops him from the sky into a lake, you can only image how stressful this must be.orPeter is afraid of drowning and nearly drowns in a lake while tangled in a parachute that was supposed to keep him safe.Prompt: No! I can't swim!Hiatus until further notice





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> i nearly drowned once and i gotta say, its not a lot of fun :/
> 
> this first chapter was exactly 1000 words in my google docs and i am p l e a s e d :))))
> 
> unbetaed

Their van was fast, and sure, they had scary alien tech, but he could be faster, he could dodge their shots. He  _ had _ to, he couldn’t risk letting them get away, he can’t risk what might happen if they continue on like this. He was chasing them from above now, running across rooftops.

With a final large leap, he vaulted off the roof he was running on, to the van, only to be snatched out of the air, sharp claws digging into his skin. He knew it was the Vulture, who else would it be? The ground was growing more and more distant, if his heart was racing before then it might as well have stopped now, his world was spinning, his movements becoming more frantic. 

There was a brief feeling of movement on his back in his spider-suit before he felt something open up, ripping him from the Vultures grasp, only to tangle on him, encasing him in a cocoon-like trap. He wasn’t sure what this feature was supposed to be, if it was supposed to help him, but he was definitely going to remember to disable it if he lived through this. 

He couldn’t see, but he knew he was falling.  _ Falling. _ To  _ what _ exactly, he didn’t know. His spidey-scene was screaming at him  _ YOU NEED TO M O V E!!!!,  _ but he couldn’t. Try as he might, he was completely and utterly, stuck. 

This was it, this was the end of Spider-Man. 

Peter could feel the icy chill of the lake before he even hit the water, but when he did finally land, he wished he hadn’t. The freezing temperature of the water instantly settled deep into his bones, bringing back memories of a similar time that he would give anything to forget.

Try as he might, he could not free himself from his suits parachute, the fabric felt like it was clinging tighter and tighter to him by every second that went by.

He knew he was going to drown, there was nobody here to save him. He could feel his body shutting down, giving in to the fatigue that was settling over him, his brain struggling to stay active and not fall out.

Unsurprisingly enough, to Peter at least, he was able to detach himself from the current situation pretty easily. But what his mind kept bringing was not something that he had ever wanted to remember, but it seems that traumas can never quite leave you, can they? 

Peter’s mind kept replaying an old memory, it was foggy around the edges, but it was there nonetheless.

A memory of himself. He couldn’t have been more than 4 years old, since he was still living with his parents at the time. He remembers that his mom had brought him with her to a friends house, saying that he could play with her friends son while he was there.

The boy in question, he didn’t know the name of until years later. But his face, he remembers with shocking detail. He was much older than Peter, being 11 at the time. His jet black hair contrasting with his pale white skin. His rounded cheeks and toothy smile gave the perfect picture of childish innocence. But his  _ eyes. _ His eyes were a dull hazel that held such a deep seated hatred that he still couldn’t understand, even to this day. What could have happened to make such a young child hold so much hatred for the world?

From the moment they laid eyes on each other, they both already had an opinion of one another. Peter didn’t trust this child, he could feel in his bones that there was something not  _ right  _ about him.

Peter later found out that the boy though Peter to be repulsive, and deserving of cruelty.

Against his better judgement, Peter had tried to make friends with the boy, only to be yelled at and teased, called a baby and a loser.

At some point, Peter had grown tired of this and had tried to leave the other to find his mom. But when he made a move to leave, the other boy had pushed him, making him hit his head on the hard floor, and held him down, laughing at his struggles to free himself. 

The last thing he remembers is shouting, “No! I can’t swim!” before being thrown into the deep end of an in ground pool.

Sometimes if he thought about it too hard, he could still feel the water rushing into his lungs,cutting off his breathing.

Peter had passed out shortly after going under the water, but woke up coughing and wheezing, having water spilling out of his mouth, gagging at the feeling.

He remembers his mom sobbing, trying to get him to speak, to move, to do  _ anything. _ But he was in so much pain that he didn’t want to move out of fear that it would get worse. 

He remembers laying in a hospital bed, listening to the steady beep of the heart monitor. He remembers his mother asking him what had happened, and him telling her that the other boy had thrown him into the pool. But his mother hadn’t believed him, she had said that the boy told them that Peter had slipped while walking along the edge and fell in, she said that he must have been remembering wrong, since the doctors had found a bump on his head, they assumed that he had got it when he fell, likely hitting his head on the way down.

After that Peter never trusted adults the same way. Sure, he trusted them, but not to believe what he has to say. Not to take his words into consideration. 

In present time, Peter was barely hanging on to consciousness when he was finally pulled from the lake. When he could hear the faint sounds of someone talking to him, telling him that he would be alright, he finally let himself rest, giving letting himself slip into unconsciousness. 


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> tony pov :)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> its still wednesday! 9:43 pm to be exact 
> 
> i think that when im done writing this entire thing that i might go through and edit and make changes, since most of this is probably incomprehensible since i wrote most of these at 2 AM, but this chap has already been mostly rewritten from 2 am draft

Tony had been working in the Stark Tower on blueprints for a new Iron Man suit when FRIDAY had given him an alert, saying that Peter had been rapidly carried 100+ feet off the ground in under 60 seconds.

Letting out a small  _ ‘fuck’ _ under his breath, Tony debated on whether or not to go help the kid himself, or just send an empty suit to fix whatever problem the kid had gotten himself into this time.

In the end, he decided to go himself, maybe try and knock some sense into the kid personally.

When he was flying in his Iron Man suit out the window, he got another alert, this time saying that the kids parachute had been deployed. 

Tony had thought that this would make his job easier, but quickly realized that this was not the case, when FRIDAY said that he was falling from the sky, and that the parachute had likely tangled.

Panic set in, _ Peter was in danger. _

FRIDAY pulled Peter’s vitals without needing to be asked, already knowing what her creator wanted. Upon seeing the stats, though, Tony’s heart sank. Peters heart rate was through the roof, beating slightly irregularly, likely due to the stress, but then it suddenly begins to mellow out. But that is what really scares the man. 

He set the suits thrusters to max speed, trying to reach Peter before he hit the ground, but when he got within a mile, all he could see was a lake where his kid was supposed to be. 

A deep seed of dread had taken a hold of his heart. There was no way that Peter was here, he had to have had the wrong location! But FRIDAY was giving him Peters vitals, and he knew that he had to be under that water. His heart rate was steadily decreasing along with his breathing, which appeared to only be taking water in, if FRIDAY was correct. his kid was  _ drowning. _

The Iron Man suit was not made to go under water, but  _ hell _ if he wasn’t going to go under anyway.

When they broke through the waters surface, Peter laid limp in his arms like a dead weight, the parachute hanging off of him like a second skin, holding onto him and refusing to let go. 

He felt like he was working too slow, like every passing second was one second closer to the kid dying- and, yeah- it  _ was.  _

He was repeating “You’ll be okay, you’re alright, I promise.” over and over again, and truly, he couldn’t tell if he was trying to reassure Peter of himself at this point.

Tony pulled the stupid mask of Peter’s face, but now he could see the paleness of the boys features, his drooping eyes, and blue lips. 

His chest wasn’t moving- he wasn’t  _ breathing- _

The Iron Man gauntlets folded away at their own accord as he moved to start CPR, beginning chest compressions.

It hurt him deep in his soul to watch the water begin to spill from the child's mouth.

Telling FRIDAY to alert the Medical wing in the tower, he had an ambulance sent out to their location, as he was not confident enough in Peter’s condition to carry him using his Iron Man suit.

Within 20 minutes the ambulance had arrived, loaded Peter onto a stretcher, and transferred him into the vehicle, all without stopping the CPR. But now he had someone breathing into the kid’s mouth, trying to push any and all water out of his lungs.

His kid still wasn’t properly breathing when they got to the tower, and all he could think as they carted him away somewhere where they wouldn’t let him fallow, was,  _ don’t do this to me, Peter, I can’t lose you. _

 

\----

 

It had been 3 hours since they carted Peter away, 3 hours he spent staring at a wall, sitting in those uncomfortable waiting room chairs, waiting for news on the boys condition. 

It was just reaching 5 AM when a nurse came out to him. As soon as he saw her he was up, standing stock still, nerves evident in his posture.

The nurse didn’t bother greeting him before saying that they had Peter stable, and that they would have to hold him for a few day, if just to make sure that his lungs wouldn’t get any infections.

Tony had let out a sigh of relief, one that he had been holding for what felt like all night. She told him that he could sit by Peter if he wished, but that he likely wouldn’t be waking up anytime soon.

So when Tony finally saw him, his heart broke, his kid was practically drowning (no pun intended) in the oversized bed, its stark white sheets covering him up to his shoulders, he was hooked up to multiple wires and machines, and a breathing mask was firmly pressed over his mouth and nose.

There was a chair against the wall that Tony quietly dragged beside the hospital bed, and sat down silently, holding one of his kids cold hands in both of his own.

Peter was alright now. He would be okay.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> next chapter either over the weekend or next wednesday!!   
> comments and kudos make me write more !!! I promise!!


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> pete's pov

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> it's still the weekend for me so i made it :)

Consciousness seemed a thing of luxury when you could never seem to reach it. 

He was constantly in and out of dreaming and being awake, but when he had his eyes open, he still felt like he was dreaming, like he wasn’t really awake, and maybe, maybe he wasn’t. 

He couldn’t think, could barely see, his ears were constantly ringing, and every last one of his muscles were sore. 

All he had was his dreams. He dreamt a lot in his time here, as he slept so much. 

He dreamed about laying in the grass and picking out shapes in the clouds with a young, brown haired woman, and a young dark brown haired man wearing glasses, the three of them laughing and having fun for hours.

He dreamed about swinging through the streets of New York on white strings, people calling out hello’s below him.

He dreamed about going to space with a wizard and a robot on a giant spaceship.

He dreamed about being thrown in the deep end of the pool when he was four. About people not believing him that he hadn’t fallen, that he was pushed.

He dreaming about a woman, about her coming to see him, he thinks she was sad, but he couldn’t understand why she would be. She had brought him a blanket, she said it was his favorite.

He dreamed about why he might be feeling like this, what might have happened to make him feel so lethargic.

He dreamed about building Lego Star Wars sets with someone that he felt like was his best friend, how they would spend days at a time constructing a single box.

He was dreaming now about someone, the man was holding his hand in his dream, he could feel he was rubbing his thumb over the palm of his hand, talking to him, saying something that just sounded like jumbled mesh to him. He could only catch on to the end of what he was saying, hearing what sounded like, “-be okay. I promise.” before he fell into a deeper dreamless sleep.

  
  


\-----

  
  


When he woke up next, he felt like he was hit in the head with a sledgehammer. 

His throat was sore from disuse, his was mouth dry and cracked, and he had learned the hard way that his lips were practically sealed shut when he had opened his mouth and felt them sting from the movement.

He tried to open his eyes but his vision was still swimming, the bright white lights above him burning his eyes, but he could hear what was going on around him much better. 

There was a faint mechanical whirl sound going around him, there was the sound of footsteps farther away, and there was what he thought was breathing and a soft tap tap tapping coming from someone next to him.

His hearing was nowhere close to what he thinks it used to be, but it was coming back. Maybe now with this he might hear someone say what was going on. Maybe he might understand.

It felt like hours before he heard someone new come into the room, their footsteps were loud and heavy in the otherwise silent room. He heard the person next to him put something down, probably on a table nearby.

He heard the new person let out a sigh before talking. “Tony, you’ve gotta rest, you know he wouldn’t have wanted this.”

So the new person was a man, and the person next to him was named Tony. Peter could have sworn that he knew a Tony, that he had known someone by that name from somewhere, but it was just out of his reach.

“You know I can’t just leave him here, Rhodey. The kid needs me.”

_ Another name, Rhodey.  _

He could heard the man called Rhodey come closer to him, but he couldn’t pinpoint where exactly he was.

“Tones, listen to me, Peter isn’t going to wake up anytime soon,-” the other cutting in saying  _ you don’t know that, _ “and if he does, do you really think that he would be happy to see you doing this to yourself?”

_ Peter? _

“I just need to know he’s  _ safe. _ I think he’s close to waking up, Rhodey, I can feel it!”

“Tony you gotta take care of yourself, he isn’t awake. You know what the doctors said, he shouldn’t be waking up for another few weeks, even months. Sitting here is only going to make you sadder when every time he opens his eyes, or makes a noise, or even just shifts slightly, you think he’s waking up!” he could tell that Rhodey was upset for Tony’s health, but he couldn’t understand why Tony wouldn’t leave if Peter wasn’t supposed to wake up for so long…

He knew he was missing something very important in this, but he couldn’t figure out what it was.

“Tony,  _ please, _ at least  _ eat _ something?”

“‘M not hungry.”

“Then come take a shower, you’re playboy appearance isn’t looking too good.” Rhodey was trying to joke, probably make the man smile, but he couldn’t see if he did not not. 

He heard a sigh, then felt someone pick up his hand and lay a soft kiss on the back, and whisper, “I’ll be back soon, Petey…” before he heard them both walk out, leaving him in pure silence.

He felt like he was laying there for hours thinking before the thought dawned on him:

_ Am I Peter? _

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> comment and kudos ples!!!! thank you!!


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> prev chap pov tony

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> sorry i haven't updated in so long guys!! I had family trouble happen, so now updates will likely be a little more scrambled, but tomorrow begins exams week, so i may be writing more for the next few days, whether its for this fic or another one :)

When Peter was first wheeled away from him, Tony thought that Peter was safe now, that everything would be alright now that he was back at the tower, now that he was in the care of some of the best medical professionals in the world. Sometimes he wished he could believe his own thoughts. 

Finding Peter drowning in the lake had been hell, but waiting to see him after the fact had been its own special kind of hell. In the lake, he knew exactly where Peter was, he knew what was happening while it was happening. But now? Now he was stuck in a stuffy waiting room, sitting in a cramped plastic chair because he had wanted to sit as close to the door as possible, not wanting to waste any time that he had in crossing the room. 

When the nurse told him that he could see Peter, he all but sprinted down the hall to him, worry had eaten away at any resolve he had had left, leaving only nerves and anxiousness that only tripled when he finally saw the boy. 

Tony had sat next to Peter for hours before Pepper had come into the room to make sure they were okay. 

It was another few hours before a doctor came to speak to him about Peters condition.

The woman had said that they were expecting a full recovery within a day or two, that he should be just fine, that there was nothing to worry about. 

Three days later and they were still waiting for Peter to wake up, now he was past the point of when they estimated he would wake up. 

When an entire week pasted without improvement, people began to panic. It was obvious that they were trying to remain calm around him, but Tony could tell that something wasn’t right, that Peter should have been up by now. 

At some point, he was told that Peter might be out for about a week more, but when he read his medical reports, it said otherwise. Why that may be, he didn’t know, and frankly, he didn’t want to waste his time trying to figure it out. 

Peter wasn’t getting the professional care he needed, the medical staff seemed more worried about keeping their jobs than caring for his kid, so he called in a favor and had the boy moved to Dr. Helen Cho’s medical group. His previous doctors and nurses were all fired on the spot. 

From there he found out that Peter had entered a comatose state and wasn’t expected to wake up for possibly months. They said that the lack of oxygen had damaged his brain, but they couldn’t be sure what the full extent of it had to him until he woke up.

That was almost two months ago.

Around the one month mark, Peter began to twitch and open his eyes, he wasn’t waking up, but they at least had that as a good sign. Sometimes he would make noises, but never words. They would always come out curdled and disjointed.

Now, in present time, Peter was doing well, he was showing healthy brain activity, he was breathing normal, he wasn’t malnourished, but yet, it still felt off to not hear his constant chatter, to not be surrounded by his never ending excitement. 

It was about 11pm when Rhodey came to see him. 

Tony had been sitting next to Peter’s sleeping form, working on Stark Industries paperwork on his Starkpad when the man had walked in. he looked tired, Tony knew that those around him weren’t getting much more sleep than he was. Before Rhodey began to talk, Tony put down his Starkpad. 

There was a heavy sigh before the other spoke and said, “Tony, you’ve gotta rest, you know he wouldn’t have wanted this.”

The thing was that Tony  _ did  _ know that, he _ knew _ that Peter would hate himself for how much Tony was worrying over him, for how much time he spent sitting by his bedside, almost never leaving his side.

Instead of conveying his inner monologue, he said, “You know I can’t just leave him here, Rhodey. The kid needs me.”

Rhodey walked closer now, taking Tony’s hands into his own, “Tones, listen to me, Peter isn’t going to wake up anytime soon,-” 

“You don’t know that-!”

“and if he does, do you really think that he would be happy to see you doing this to yourself?”

“I just need to know he’s safe. I think he’s close to waking up, Rhodey, I can feel it!”  

“Tony you gotta take care of yourself, he isn’t awake. You know what the doctors said, he shouldn’t be waking up for another few weeks, even months. Sitting here is only going to make you sadder when every time he opens his eyes, or makes a noise, or even just shifts slightly, you think he’s waking up!” he knew Rhodey was mad, he knew that this was all just too much stress on them all, but he couldn’t help but feel guilt when the thought of leaving the kid for a little bit had wormed its way into his head. 

“Tony,  _ please _ , at least eat something?” 

“‘M not hungry.”

Rhodey must have been able to see the cracks breaking in his shell, he always had been good at that, because he seemed more confident when he tried to joke, “Then come take a shower, you’re playboy appearance isn’t looking too good.”

This got him to smile, and let out a defeated sigh. He squeezed his friends hands before letting go and picking up one of Peter’s limp hands, and pecking a light kiss onto the back.

“I’ll be back soon, Petey…”

And with that, he allowed Rhodey to lead him out of the stuffy medical room, but he wasn’t paying too much attention as to where they were going, all he could think of was a promise he had made to the kid, 

_ “It’s alright kid, you’ll be okay. I promise.” _

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> comments + kudos = more writing! <3

**Author's Note:**

> Does petey survive? Who is this mystery savior? How will pete talk himself out of this one (If he doesn't die)?  
> make your guesses now folks!
> 
> will hopefully update on Wednesday :)


End file.
